Miserable, Diseased, Dirty exJackass
by Chicleeblair
Summary: Dirty Uncle Sal stands outside and watches the happy people.


It was fucking idiotic of him to be standing out there, in the cold, watching that should-be-heart-wrenching scene through a window. If he'd had a camera, it would've been a goddamn Kodak moment, one they could put in their Christmas card next year, or Zola's adoption announcement, or one of those other cliché mailings that Meredith hated, but would probably be forced to send out to Shepherd's nearest and dearest to be accepted by the Stepford-esque clan he comes from.

Or maybe she wouldn't. Because that's a thing Addison would have done, and one thing he respected about Mer was that she made a point not to do stuff just because her husband's ex-wife, who fit into the clan, would have, and why was he thinking about all of this?

Right. Because the Shepherds were in there looking like an advertisement for Hallmark and he was outside like a beggar in a Dickens novel, and it was what he wanted. For them. What he wanted for them. He wanted to see Mer happy, and to get Zola out of the orphanage, and then foster care. God, if ever there were a kid who didn't need to be in fucking foster care. She _had _parents who weren't certifiable—at least Mer wasn't any more—and yet they'd kept her away from them until a week ago.

Through the window, he could see that someone, April or Lexie probably, had gone all Izzie with the decorations. Meredith carried Zola over to the glowing tree while he watched, and the baby reached out for one of the blinking lights. Her shriek of glee could be heard through the glass of the window. Alex felt the side of his lip tug up, just a little. The closest he came to a smile these days.

Like this gesture had given off a noise only babies could hear, Zola turned to the window. She had one of those sticky bows Izzie used to love stuck to the side of her head, because she was their goddamned Christmas present, how cliché could you get?

But then Mer's eyes crinkled as she whispered to Zola, could read the words _what do you see, baby girl?_ on her then lips and the almost-smile threatened again. He'd come through. For once in his life, he'd come through for her.

A gust of wind cooled whatever warmth he'd managed to gather from this thought. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his fraying coat—worn out not because he couldn't afford another one, but because he couldn't bring herself to care—and turned to head to his truck.

"What are you doing out here, Uncle Sal?"

His stomach sank the way it always had on the days the social worker showed up to inform him that his antics had gotten him tossed from another foster home. Busted. He thought about ignoring Mer, but instead he turned. Like a puppet on a goddamned string. Five years of…whatever this was…meant something. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he couldn't just take off anymore. He kind of wished he had. If he'd failed his boards five Christmases ago, he might be somewhere else entirely right now, and he might have a heart that was in one piece.

But he'd never have seen this light in Meredith's eyes.

"You tell me something, I'll tell you something?"

She nodded, tilting her head. Concern. He didn't want her concern, or her pity, but he knew he had it. And if it weren't Mer it would have burned him up inside. Instead, it just made him feel pathetic. Like a stray dog. That was what she did after all, she collected strays and then released them back into the wild. Except, he'd released himself before the splint came off, or whatever, and he was even more fucked up than before.

And her goddamned metaphor-happy way of rambling had rubbed off. Fan-freaking-tastic.

"Let's sit," she said, gesturing to the swing. "I'm exhausted. Zo's still not used to being back here. She woke up every two hours last night."

"Maybe she was just really excited about the fat man coming down the chimney."

"She's barely a year old, Alex. I don't think she understands a thing about today, except that shiny things are good and there are cookies."

He sank down onto the wooden seat next to her. "Damn, I wish all I cared about was shiny and cookies."

"Those were the days," she agreed, with a touch more vehemence than he expected. The old Mer was there somewhere after all. "So. Why are you lurking outside my house like a perv?"

"You invited me for Christmas."

"And that's happening inside. Where it's warm." She wrapped her arms around her torso for emphasis. Typical Mer, she'd come out here to rescue him without thinking to grab a jacket. That's what it'd taken the dumb social worker forever to get. She might have been careless with her own life, but she'd protect the people she loved like they were freaking Faberge eggs.

Again with the metaphors.

"Yeah. I know it is…"

"But?"

"But I feel like one of those people who's so freaking miserable he can't be around normal people," he said. "Like I might infect the happy people. Like I'm some miserable, diseased, dirty ex-jackass."

Meredith laughed at his modification of the words she'd used all those years ago on the hospital floor. The full-bodied sound filled the cold night in the seconds before her expression turned serious again. "I remember that feeling," she said. "It sucks. It sucks hard, and it sucks long."

He snorted.

"Shut up. I'm working on less sleep than an intern on their first shift, you're not allowed to dirtify the things I say."

"Isn't that my role in our little gang? I'm the fratboy who turns everything into a dirty joke."

Meredith stretched her leg out, pushing her foot against the porch railing to start the swing moving. "Oh, Alex," she murmured. "You're so much more than that."

He stared at the house across the street, which was probably going to get some sort of citation from the city for sucking up too much power it had so many freaking lights covering it. He swallowed once, opened his mouth to make some sort of joke, but what came out wasn't a joke at all.

"I never lived in a house where Christmas was a thing. My mom wasn't ever sane enough to decorate for the holidays, and my dad drank away all the money that might have got spent on stuff. Aaron and I used to pool whatever we had to buy stuff for Amber, but it wasn't ever anything special. Not special enough, anyway, and we never had the cozy Christmas under a bright green tree, that's for sure.

"I never thought I'd be the kind of person who _wanted_ the Christmas around the fire with the shrieking kids and the wrapping paper everywhere. But then there she was…and it was her favorite holiday. She freaking lit up at the holidays. And suddenly I could see myself hanging up stockings and putting together bicycles in the middle of the night, and God knows what else. And even though she's gone, I can still see it. Like, I can imagine those stupid kids, and the way she'd be going crazy trying to bake the perfect cookies for them, and…and then I open my eyes, and it's like I'm getting shot again, because the dream is dying. And it has been dying over and over again for two years."

Meredith let out a long, low breath. She didn't say anything. The silence left him alone with his thouhts, alone with the imaginary blond children he'd cast in his dreams from the day he brought Izzie a cupcake in the hospital, through jacking off in a goddamned cup, walking down the aisle. Even the day she'd reappeared at the hospital, right before she left him for good.

"Aren't you going to tell me you know how I feel, because you still think someone will walk up here and take Zola away? Or that you lost Shepherd so many times that sometimes it still hurts to breathe because the bullet wound hasn't healed? Or that you never had the presents under the fireplace or whatever, and you didn't know how much you wanted it until you had to fight for it?"

His vocal chords tightened around the last words, and a tumor-sized lump rose up in his throat. Maybe he'd get throat cancer and it'd metastasize and they could just be done with all of this. The bitter thought made him inhale sharply. "God," he murmured. "God, I'm fucked up." He pressed his hands against his eyes, and hunched over. Still, she stayed silent. "Aren't you going to say something? Aren't you going to give me the freaking Meredith Grey wisdom that'll make the fucking pain go away?"

Meredith slipped her thin hand into his jacket pocket, forcing her fingers between his. Something about her grip—so tight for someone so tiny—grounded him. He exhaled, long and low, and his throat began to relax, just a little.

"I don't have a prescription for this, Alex," she said. "I can't say words that will make it heal. I can't tell you only time will do that, or you'll get through it, because I don't know. Sometimes things hurt so much, and so deeply, you don't ever really get past them. And it's not like a broken leg that twinges when it rains, or something, because it's there all the time, buried under all the good times. But it doesn't make the good times any worse, and those come again. You've been through enough crap to know they do. The roller-coaster goes up again eventually, it just doesn't stop bumping."

He turned to her, swallowing one more time to make sure the lump had entirely dissipated. With his free hand, he touched her cheek, tilting her head to make her meet his eyes. "Yeah," he said. "You really are tired."

She laughed again, and she knew he read his true meaning in his eyes. "You should know you're not alone. I know you feel like you are without her, and you're still so hurt and lost that you're lashing out and accidentally causing things—lives—to come crashing down, but Alex, you're not alone."

"How the hell can you be so nice to me? I practically lost you your job and your daughter."

"Well, when you put it that way…" She raised her eyebrows, considering, then shook her head. "I've ruined my own life a lot more than you've ruined it. I've torn it to shreds. And I've been alone, thinking that no one wanted to deal with my crap, no one could bring me out of my misery. But you didn't stop trying. You, Cristina, George, even Izzie. Especially Izzie. None of you let me destroy myself or disappear. And I'm not going to let you. Do your worst, because I guarantee you, I can handle it. And so can you." She squeezed his hand, then stood up, lifting his arm out of his pocket. "Now come on. You may not have half a dozen kids who want you to track down double-AA batteries, but I think Zola will be pretty happy to see her uncle Alex."

The warmth he felt watching her through the window resurfaced, just a tiny spark—the hint of an ember, nowhere near an entire fire-and-fireplace. "I'm her uncle Alex?"

"Of course you are. You're my brother, Alex Karev, like it or not. You've got a family. It may not be the one you pictured, but you've got one. Accepting it is your choice."

"And if I don't? If I…can't?"

"Then you can go to Joe's and seduce some bimbo, but it won't make the emptiness go away. It'll just lead to incredible awkwardness when she shows up at the hospital. And since you work at Seattle Grace, she will. It's inevitable."

He stood up. "Well. I guess I'll accept my fate."

Meredith frowned for a second, misinterpreting him for the first time, because he had made the choice she wouldn't have made in the days when she was a miserable, diseased, dirty ex-mistress. But he'd learned from her mistakes as much as his own. After all, look where she'd ended up. She'd become the one on the inside, and from the outside that looked pretty damn good. He walked toward the door, then turned with his fingers on the knob. Her face had lit up as brightly as those seizure-inducing lights across the street.

"Wait a sec," he said. "Do I have to be Shepherd's brother-in-law?"

She laughed again, and inexplicably the words _I heard the bells on Christmas day _popped into his head. "Come on. We have eggnog. It'll dull the pain of that particular revelation."

She looped her arm through his and tugged open the door. Zola let out another gleeful shriek at the sight of her mother. Alex met Mer's eyes for a split second before Derek handed the baby off to her. He didn't say thank you. He didn't tell her how glad he was to have her for his sister, or anything like that.

Instead, he hung up his coat and went over to help Shepherd assemble Zola's new bouncy-seat and wondered if the goofy book of nursery rhymes he'd bought was even close to good enough for her.


End file.
